I'm not quite clear why the French government thinks it has a monopoly on controlling Airbus locations (see article). It's a European-wide company.
Separately, I wonder if major assemblies will be shipped across the Atlantic, such as wings from the Broughton plant, or if they will be manufactured in the US.
Geographically nicely located, more and cheaper space, cheaper workforce, lower taxes ...... but wait:
Wasn't that exactly what the Europeans reproached the ME carriers and titled it 'unfair competition'?
God bless double standards and disrespect for European workers.
So Europe will have left over the production of the 380 and, hopefully, the 350. Both types promising low profits, if any ever.... Good morning pay pressure and subsidies.
The better selling 320 will be manufactured elsewhere and its profits kept there
for the sake of management bonuses!
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Spreading their business between a dollar and Euro overhead cost based business sounds like a good thing to do. Besides it is still the most important market for aviation ,which is another good reason to be there. Contrary to what people may think, skilled labor is very hard to come by in sufficient numbers both in France and Germany, there might be a growing number of unemployed but certainly not so much for technically skilled labor and as much as it might hurt, the truth is that this economy doesn't really need all those psychologists, criminologists and political science majors, they're simple not very useful when you try to built something.
Contrary to what some seem to believe here, it's not the entire production of the A320 that is moving West and East, just a small portion of it. France may yell foul but when push comes to shove and when Airbus decides to go ahead with the move, there is nothing substantial they can and will do about it.
The logic is simple and this has been mooted many times in the past. Aircraft sales are always priced in USD so having a substantial portion of your cost base in USD reduces currency variation risks.
A small percentage change in the EUR/USD rate between sale and delivery can wipe out profits on a deal. To reduce this risk it is necessary to hedge currency on the futures market which again costs money.
Long story short = Airbus confirm they are indeed looking at another overseas production site but their spokesperson is saying it's not a done deal, anywhere, yet...
Well they are going to announce at CERN (Centre Europe'enne pour la Rercherhe Nucle'aire) the discovery of the Higgs particle on July 4th, at 2AM Fermilab time. Now they are going to build their yokeless pilotless (well not quite) airplanes here. What's a patriot to do?
I'm not quite clear why the French government thinks it has a monopoly on controlling Airbus locations (see article). It's a European-wide company.
I'm not quite clear where you see that in the article, either. I mean... the new french gov "has a problem" with the relocation of industries out of the country, when that means less jobs (french facility closing) and a negative impact on the trade balance.
The current A320 family has IIRC 3 FALs (Toulouse, Hamburg, Tianjin). A fourth one doesn't mean a closure of any of the above: the A320neo is, so far, a commercial success, and the production rate should rise, above the current facilities capabilities.
Oh, and this is not -exactly- a news:
Quote:
Industry analyst consensus, as well as prevailing wisdom inside Boeing, concludes the European airframer cannot achieve 60 A320s a month without major expansion of its Toulouse, Hamburg or Tianjin, China lines.
This would open the door to a US-based final assembly line in Mobile, Alabama, current site of an Airbus engineering centre, late in the decade to meet the replacement demand in North America.
My question is ‘If Airbus builds a final assembly line in the states, where will the components be built? If the production rate for long range is also being increased will Broughton have the capacity to build yet more wing sets for the US A320 FAL?’.
I'm not quite clear why the French government thinks it has a monopoly on controlling Airbus locations (see article). It's a European-wide company.
Well I think the French government would have some real experience in this if they have looked at some past history, not so much for other participating countries. Recall that GE and Snecma (mainly French government owned at the time) joined forces to develop, assemble, test, market and sell CFM56 engines. The original slogan was "Share to Gain". Fan and LPT modules are manufactured in France and shipped to the US, Compressor and HPT modules are manufactured in the US and shipped to France. 50% of the engines are assembled in France, the other 50% are assembled in the US. "Gain" it turned out to be, 26,000 engines later and still going strong. In the beginning, it was a pretty rocky start at in the US regarding union objections (lost jobs), technology transfers (US government) and political pressures (Washington). Nobody is complaining now.
The Airbus A-320 can work in very much the same manner. As has been pointed out, there is a great port facility to accept fuselage sections, wings, tail and vertical stabilizers, the workforce will be non-union and the talent is available. Also, the US market is a big market for Airbus/Boeing single aisle jets with airline consolidation and the need for new equipment. Boeing has their eyes set on China. They enjoy having a large market share there and it has more potential as time goes on.
The Airbus timing is good if they move quickly with the A-320 Neo going into production in a few years. Aircraft assembly always turns out to be the bottleneck when times are good. The ability to have two assembly plants overcomes many of the problems verses having only one plant. IMHO, this would be a good business move for Airbus to go forward with. Timing is everything...
